


Comfort

by fictorium (orphan_account)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-03
Updated: 2012-07-03
Packaged: 2017-11-09 02:02:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/450024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/fictorium





	Comfort

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Français available: [Réconfort](https://archiveofourown.org/works/870997) by [hotladykisses](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hotladykisses/pseuds/hotladykisses)



“Oh my god,” Emma mutters as she walks into the sitting room. It looks like a Kleenex factory exploded in here, and it actually takes a long minute to pick Regina out amidst all the soft surfaces covered in blankets, tissues and the debris from a hundred different pills and possibly potions.

“Uggggh,” is all Regina says from the overstuffed sofa she’s lying on. “Help me.”

“Are you dying?” Emma asks, hands firmly on her hips. Regina called the station on 911 to get her attention, but Emma is not optimistic about there being an actual emergency.

“Yes,” Regina wails, her dark eyes red-rimmed and pleading. “Can I have some tea?”

“Don’t you have a housekeeper?” Emma asks, risking a couple of steps closer. 

“She quit. Again,” Regina says after a coughing fit.

“You really are pathetic, aren’t you?” Emma says, and she’s surprised by how sympathetic it sounds. Relations have been improving with Regina since Henry called a truce (he thinks it’ll help Operation Cobra if Emma has access to his Mom without him). “Fine, I’ll make you tea. But then I have a town to police.”

“It’s St-ack-Storybrooke,” Regina splutters. “Not Baltimore. You can tone down the hard-bitten cop routine for an hour.”

Emma groans and takes off in search of the kitchen. Somehow she can’t see Regina as the domestic type (except for the persuasive mental image of her stirring things in a cauldron) but the kitchen is neatly organized so making tea isn’t that difficult. Emma wouldn’t have known how last year, but thankfully Mary Margaret drinks the stuff like there’s going to be Tea Prohibition tomorrow. 

 

She creeps back to the sitting room with the mug in both hands, knowing it’s not worth the endless grief to spill anything in Regina’s precious ‘palace’. Maybe Emma will get lucky and Regina will have fallen asleep.

“You took your time,” Regina accuses. 

“Sorry,” Emma says with a little shrug. “Had to find my way around your kitchen.”

“I don’t get sick,” Regina explains as she accepts the warm mug. “I mean, I’ve never really been sick before.”

“I suppose you used to just cast a spell on your symptoms, huh?” Emma teases. “Or did you have one that just made you immune?”

“Ha ha,” Regina croaks. “Anything has to be better than this crap from the drugstore. It’s not helping at all.”

“It’s the common cold, Madam Mayor. It won’t kill you,” Emma points out. “Have you tried a bath? The steam helps.”

“I will, maybe,” Regina agrees, watching Emma like a hawk as she sits on the chair nearest Regina’s temporary sickbed. “I just can’t seem to get warm.”

“I thought you were supposed to be cold-blooded,” Emma mocks, unable to resist. But a memory strikes her as she does: of being eleven, and catching what felt like pneumonia after being locked out on the porch all night in November. It led to mild frostbite on fingers and toes, which a well-meaning teacher noticed and reported to DCFS.

Another foster home gone, and not the worst of them either. Emma was sick the whole way through the change, and as she cried in her bed on the children’s ward all she wanted was someone to hug her and make the shivering stop. She still doesn’t have much experience in that area, but there’s some primal need for human contact that gives a warmth no quilt or blanket can match.

And somewhere in her reminiscence, Emma tips all the way over to feeling sorry for Regina. Regina has already confessed over bourbon that she’s heartbroken when Henry refuses to hug her anymore, and with Graham gone it occurs to Emma that Regina probably doesn’t have anyone else.

“Regina?” She asks, nervous of even using the first name.

“Yes?” Regina is feeling too sorry for herself to complain about the informality.

“If I do something for you—something that will make you feel a little bit better—can you promise not to take it the wrong way?”

Regina’s laser glare fixes on Emma’s face in a second, suspicion the default setting as soon as anything seems out of the ordinary.

“I would think that depends,” Regina answers cautiously.

“Right,” Emma says, standing up and kicking off her boots (thankfully she has the regulation police issue and not her own knee-highs). Next to go is her coat, thrown over the back of the armchair. 

“If your proposal is a lap dance, Ms Swan, I don’t see how—”

“Shush,” Emma warns, not wanting to be sabotaged now that the idea is lodged firmly in her head. It feels like absolutely the right thing to do, and Emma knows by now that she should trust her gut. “Now, scoot,” she instructs Regina, who looks at Emma like she’s having some kind of psychotic break right there by the coffee table.

“Ms Swan—” 

But Emma cuts her off by just pulling the blankets aside and sitting down right next to Regina. 

“You really have no concept of appropriate, do you?” Regina mutters, glaring at Emma all over again.

“Shut up,” Emma sighs. “And come here. We’re kind of friends now, right? For Henry’s sake?”

“Allegedly,” Regina says with a sneer. She looks really rattled by how close Emma is, and Emma would be lying to herself if she tried to deny there’s some satisfaction in this. 

“You called me here to help you. This is me helping,” Emma explains. “Now, come here.” She opens her arms to make it clearer, and Regina recoils like Emma just offered her a boa constrictor.

“Oh for God’s—” Emma snaps, leaning over and bodily yanking Regina into a hug. At first it’s like trying to embrace something made of stone, but after an endless minute, Regina exhales loudly and starts to relax into it.

“Oh,” she mutters against Emma’s shoulder. “Oh.”

“Better, right?” Emma presses.

“The body heat,” Regina sighs happily. “It’s just the body heat.”

But Emma isn’t really listening because she’s horrified at another little discovery: she’s enjoying the hug, too. Not necessarily in a platonic way, either, judging by the surge that just coursed through her abdomen. Oh, hell. Not cool. Not cool at all. Has it really been so long since she got laid that a simple hug from a woman she doesn’t even understand can get Emma going? It would appear so.

Instead of pulling away after a polite interval, Regina actually gets more into the whole hugging scene. She wriggles around a little until she’s fully snuggled into Emma’s side, with Regina’s arm falling naturally around Emma’s torso and pulling her a little closer. Regina’s breathing is a little snotty and she’s burning up, Emma is pretty sure, but it definitely feels nice to be cuddled up on the sofa like this, no matter how surreal it is.

They don’t speak for a long time, and Emma finds herself feeling sleepy even though it’s the middle of the afternoon. She’s leaning her cheek against the top of Regina’s head when the other woman speaks.

“Thank you,” she says quietly. “You’re a good person, aren’t you? That’s why everyone likes you so much.”

Emma just shrugs, not sure what response Regina is hoping for.

“It’s why Henry loves you so much. Terrible things have happened to you and still you show kindness to a total bitch like me. Life hasn’t broken you, Emma Swan. Why do you suppose that is?”

“I… don’t know,” Emma trails off, embarrassed. She’s not thinking at all as she rubs a soothing hand over Regina’s back. That produces another happy sigh from Regina, snug in her blankets and sweats, leeching all of Emma’s body heat quite shamelessly. It’s so easy, so instantly familiar, that Emma takes the next step without thinking: pressing a soft kiss to the top of Regina’s head. 

Emma freezes the moment she realizes. Uh oh.

Regina looks up then, but without pulling away from Emma’s embrace in the slightest. There’s a question in her eyes, and even though she looks tired and ill, there’s no denying anymore that she’s also gorgeous. Beautiful in a way that Emma didn’t think she’d ever need words to describe, but it turns out that moving to Storybrooke is changing a lot more than just her address. This damn hug has a lot to answer for.

“Sorry,” she says, again. It’s hard to believe there was a time when she’d have taken a smack in the mouth before she’d apologize to Regina, but look how far they’ve come.

“Don’t be,” Regina whispers. “But I—”

Emma sees the opportunity and kisses Regina quickly on the lips. It’s like a middle school game of Spin the Bottle or something, but it happens. Instead of throwing Emma off the sofa, or slapping her, Regina just smiles. 

“You can’t kiss me, not like this,” Regina says.

“I know,” Emma groans. “God, I’m sorry. I should go.”

“No,” Regina says, placing a hand on Emma’s chest to keep her seated. “I mean you can’t right now, or you’ll get sick, too.”

“Oh,” Emma says, realizing Regina’s meaning. “So, it would be okay?”

“Very okay,” Regina confirms. “I was beginning to think you weren’t interested after all.”

“You knew? How could you know?” Emma splutters. “I didn’t know until your head started taking up residence in my cleavage.”

“I know everything, Ms Swan. You’d do well to remember that,” Regina replies, smirking again. 

“But the hugging is okay? For now?” Emma asks, nervous like it’s a first date.

“Yes. In fact, I insist on it,” Regina states, before returning her head to a more comfortable position. Emma breathes out, hard, and relaxes a tiny little bit.

“You know,” she confesses. “It might just have been worth you calling 911 after all.


End file.
